


in disguise of revelation

by wordstruck



Series: flutterbird (a collection of sakuatsu one-shots) [1]
Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: (or rather violent ish thoughts), Alternate Universe - Canon, Character Study, Falling In Love, Introspection, M/M, Minor Violence, Pining, Pining Miya Atsumu, miya atsumu has slightly darkish thoughts
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-19
Updated: 2020-02-19
Packaged: 2021-02-27 23:47:59
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,667
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22804333
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/wordstruck/pseuds/wordstruck
Summary: “Did you need something, Miya-san?” Sakusa asks. Is this, Atsumu wonders wryly, how thieves feel when they’re caught.“Omi-kun,” he replies with a slow-blooming foxkill grin. “Lemme set for ya.”Ah, there it is. A flicker of something colder behind that flat gaze, a there-and-gone-again that still hits Atsumu like a lightning strike. It makes his grin widen.“My name,” the other boy says, in a voice of steel under paper, “is Sakusa.”
Relationships: Miya Atsumu/Sakusa Kiyoomi
Series: flutterbird (a collection of sakuatsu one-shots) [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1643680
Comments: 55
Kudos: 1061
Collections: One shots, Sakuatsu





	in disguise of revelation

**Author's Note:**

> i honestly have no idea how i walked myself into this ship but here we are i guess. i'm not even caught up on the manga past the kamomedai match but sakusa kiyoomi has made a nice little warm spot for himself in my brain. i really hope i managed to write him and atsumu well.
> 
> this fic really all started because i wanted to use the birds/hands metaphor for sakusa and because i like the idea of atsumu fixating on things in slightly dark and twisty ways. he seems the type.
> 
> fic edited as best as i can, so i hope it makes a coherent story! any further errors will be fixed in retrospect. title is from "dustland fairytale" by the killers. enjoy!

* * *

Sakusa Kiyoomi has pretty hands.

Atsumu knows this, because he’s looked at them on many occasions. During practice matches, during training camps, during tournaments. Atsumu has no idea why of all things it is Sakusa’s hands that fascinate him, or when that had even started to be a fascination, but here he is all the same. Perhaps it’s because Atsumu’s own hands carry such significance for him; perhaps it’s because Sakusa refuses to touch many of the things around him but handles a volleyball like it was born for the curve of his palm. Perhaps both.

(Sometimes Atsumu watches Sakusa on the court, the breadth of his shoulders and the sweeping line from chest to chin as he arches back for a spike. He watches Sakusa’s hand come up to hit the ball, fingers fluttering an instant before locking together for impact. Inexplicably, he thinks of birds, then thinks of taking those soft-wing fingers and crushing them.

Sometimes Atsumu looks at Sakusa like this: he could wrap his own hands around those fine-boned wrists and break them. He wants to. He won’t.

He tells Osamu about this, once. His twin glances at him sidewise for a scathing moment, then shrugs and rolls his eyes. Atsumu is grateful that he’s this transparent to one person in his life.)

Sakusa catches him once, way back, during a practice match in Hyogo. They are both first years but Sakusa is already in the starting lineup, while Atsumu is fighting to leave the bench. The Inarizaki setter has been watching as the other boy carefully, meticulously lays out a packet of alcohol wipes, a bottle of sanitizer, and a towel inside a ziplock bag, each item carefully arranged at the end of the dugout bench. There’s a peculiarity to the way Sakusa moves his hands when he’s not playing volleyball; Atsumu can’t describe it, but it reminds him of feathers.

When he finally tears his eyes away, he finds Sakusa watching him in return, eyes narrowed in the space between his bangs and the edge of his mask. It’s not — angry, not really, and it’s not resentful either. It feels as if Sakusa’s trying to crack him open to find Atsumu’s dirty little secret and bite into it like candy.

“Did you need something, Miya-san?” Sakusa asks. Is this, Atsumu wonders wryly, how thieves feel when they’re caught.

“Omi-kun,” he replies with a slow-blooming foxkill grin. (And he hits a nail on the head — the unwelcome nickname makes Sakusa’s eye twitch just slightly.) “Lemme set for ya.”

Ah, there it is. There’s a flicker of something colder behind that flat gaze, a there-and-gone-again that still hits Atsumu like a lightning strike. It makes his grin widen. Cavalier mischief is his best shield.

“My name,” the other boy says, in a voice of steel under paper, “is Sakusa.”

Itachiyama goes on to crush Inarizaki in the practice match, 25-17, 25-15. Atsumu had thought Sakusa wouldn’t be petty enough to aim his spikes at or over him; had thought the other boy would simply shrug the interaction to the back of his mind. But Atsumu leaps in for a one-on-one block, only to realize Sakusa has faked a quick and has delayed his attack. His spike whistles right above Atsumu’s head, down to the floor.

Fortunately, Atsumu is also not above such pointed gestures.

He waits until Sakusa has begun moving left for a block, then tips the ball over the net, right to the spot that the opposing spiker has just vacated. His sense of satisfaction is vicious.

Sakusa calmly smashes the next point into the far corner to take the match, then flexes his hand open-close as he lands back on the floor.

Atsumu wants to splinter those fingers. He loses instead.

Unsurprisingly, facing Itachiyama in a practice match and facing them in a tournament are two entirely different experiences. It isn’t that Sakusa holds back when there are no stakes, no; he simply just—

It’s different. He’s different. And it frustrates Atsumu, a needle scraping metal surfaces.

They officially face off for the first time in the Spring High tournament of Atsumu’s first year. He knows his school gets called the _strongest challengers_ and _perennial contenders_ , and he knows _why,_ but Atsumu is determined to change that. They’ve got a strong team, and now with him and Osamu in the starting lineup, they have better chances.

Atsumu is too used to hogging headlines and spotlights to give it up now that he’s on the biggest stage of Japanese youth volleyball.

He's been trying not to look at the brackets, but he knows there’s a match-up against Itachiyama waiting for them in the quarterfinals.

“Or,” Osamu points out flatly, “we could lose before that. 'S just the third round.”

“Can it, would ya,” Atsumu replies without looking up from where he’s untaping his fingers. He’d jammed his left pinky while trying to block a spike, but he hates wearing tape in a match. 

“He’s got a point,” Aran chimes in while tying his shoes. “One game at a time, Atsumu-kun.”

“I _know_ that.” Atsumu flexes his fingers open-close as he gets up, gritting his teeth. He knows that; of course he knows that. He’s lost before. They’ve lost to Itachiyama each and every time they’ve faced off. But they’re different now; he’s their setter now. He can lift them further and he will.

“Could all of you be quiet,” Kita mutters as he walks past, and all of them immediately shut their mouths and straighten up. Atsumu takes a deep breath, closes his eyes, exhales.

Just once, in this match, he’d like to bring out Sakusa’s frustration so that it’s written all over his face.

When they bulldoze Shiratorizawa in three down-the-wire sets, it feels like a culmination.

When they take to the court for their match against Itachiyama, Atsumu feels invincible.

Later, outside the team hotel:

“This’s like—” Osamu frowns, face tilted up to the sky. “What’s the fucker’s name? Ikuryo? Ikemen?”

Atsumu tries to summon a laugh but it dries up somewhere in his throat. “Icarus,” he says hoarsely. “The Greek idiot.”

“Flew too close t’ the sun,” Osamu adds with a wry smile. 

Atsumu knows what Osamu is insinuating, but he won’t give the other boy the satisfaction. His twin is wrong, anyhow; they’re not Icarus, this isn’t their end of the line, they haven’t fallen. So what if they’d been crushed yet again; so what if Komori had read that last setter tip easily, returning it to the perfect spot for Sakusa to get the match-clinching hit. So what if Atsumu’s got all his emotions scrawled over his face while Sakusa hadn’t cracked so much as a smile.

(So what if Atsumu had held his hand out for a post-match handshake, and Sakusa had barely touched the tips of his fingers to Atsumu’s skin before walking off. So what.)

“We’ll get ‘em next time,” he declares instead. “We’ll take all of ‘em down.”

Osamu glances at him sidewise again, then hums.

“I hear ya.”

(There are four points on Atsumu’s right palm that have been set alight. He could have reached out, he knows; could have dragged Sakusa into a proper handshake, squeezed those flutterbird fingers too tight. That would’ve gotten _something_ out of Sakusa even if they hadn’t managed that on the volleyball court.

But doing that would be cheating. Sakusa isn’t even aware of the game that Atsumu’s playing — if this is even a game at all, whatever this is — but still, it—

Sakusa Kiyoomi has pretty hands, and if Atsumu were to touch them, he wants it to be because Sakusa’s reaching out to him. Not that he’ll admit that out loud, of course.)

.o0o.

Atsumu has wondered, idly and offhandedly, what it would be like to set to Sakusa. He himself has plenty of experience setting for a variety of attackers over the years he’s been playing. On the other hand, Osamu has told him that his demanding personality makes him difficult to play with, even while his skills as a setter lift his entire team.

(“S’like — your sets’re really easy to hit, ya know?” his twin points out. “But I really, really hate that you’re the one tossing the ball.”

“The fuck is wrong with it bein’ me?” Atsumu asks, indignant. Osamu just heaves a long-suffering sigh, which Suna follows with a considering nod. _“Oi!”_ )

Atsumu feels that Sakusa would be both a delight and a pain to set for. His skills as a spiker are undeniable, but Atsumu has seen the way Sakusa watches the tosses that come his way. _Assessment,_ that’s what the other boy does; assessing the set and deciding how to hit it, and where. And Atsumu is too accustomed to demanding that spikers hit his tosses to the best of their ability; he’s not sure how he’d handle a spiker demanding that every toss be perfect to hit.

He gets the chance to find out during the youth volleyball training camp in the early summer. At Inarizaki, Atsumu and Aran both receive invites, and both of them accept. Atsumu turns up in Shibuya and is unsurprised to find Sakusa and Komori are there as well. 

“Oh,” Komori says as they approach. “It’s you guys.”

“Pretty obvious we’d be here, ya know,” Atsumu drawls. His eyes flick from Komori to Sakusa standing behind him, narrowing them in amusement when he finds the other boy glaring. But Sakusa doesn’t say anything, just turns and walks away from the little group. Komori grimaces apologetically.

No matter. There’s no avoiding anyone in a setup like this.

Eventually, the coaches in charge separate them into teams for practice matches. And inevitably, he and Sakusa end up on the same team.

“Yo.” Atsumu’s grin is foxkill as he saunters onto the court. 

Sakusa scowls in response, right hand clenching. “I don’t understand why they’d invite _you_ here.”

Atsumu stares at him for a moment, then feels genuinely surprised at the _anger_ that flares in his ribs _._ He deserves to be acknowledged, and it’s pissing him the fuck off because they’d met in the quarterfinals at _Nationals_ , for fuck’s sake. Atsumu had been the best setter in Kansai during middle school. He’s a starter for Inarizaki as a _freshman._

Where the fuck does Sakusa get the right to capsize Atsumu like this and then not even recognize his skill?

“I,” he says, staring Sakusa in the eye, “am gonna make ya demand I send ya a toss.”

They play the entirety of the second set together. Atsumu sends a total of twelve sets Sakusa’s way. He uses Sakusa as a decoy five other times, including once for a setter dump.

When they walk off the court to change players, Atsumu turns to find Sakusa looking down at his hand and flexing, open-close, open-close. 

_Well?,_ he wants to ask. _What didja think, how did ya feel? Didja spike better off my toss?_

“Told ya,” he says instead. “I’m the best setter here, ain’t I?”

The other boy just hums under his breath and squeezes his hand into a fist. He glances at Atsumu, and this time the glare is more — considering, maybe. Contemplative. Or perhaps Atsumu’s just imagining things.

Sakusa gives Atsumu a long look, then drops his hand to his side. He walks away from the court without saying a thing.

Oddly enough, for Atsumu, it feels like a victory.

(He’d been right, though — setting a ball for Sakusa _is_ both a pain and a delight. The other boy weighs each ball that comes his way; plays an analytical style of volleyball that is both surprising and yet completely _him._ Now that they are on the same side of the court, Atsumu can appreciate better why Sakusa is one of the top high school aces in the country at just sixteen-turning-seventeen.

It is a war of attrition between them, even if they _are_ on one team. Atsumu sends every toss up with a demand of _hit this, you have no other choice._ Sakusa watches the arc of the ball and decides _fine, this one’s worth it._ There is a rivalry brewing that neither of them had expected, but Atsumu will make Sakusa recognize it all the same.

He’s never felt like this before. Atsumu looks at Sakusa on the court, and desperately wants to set for him but also wants to completely upend him. He wants to rile up this boy until he’s just as pissed off. He wants to _win._

Atsumu wants to crush Sakusa on a volleyball court like he wants to crush those flutterbird fingers.

Osamu would point out that that’s a very violent metaphor, but Osamu isn’t here so Atsumu doesn’t care.) 

Sitting on the sidelines in the training center, Atsumu considers his own hands. He’s taken good care of them up until now, never picked up an injury worse than a jammed finger or a nick. Calluses litter his skin, and the pads of his fingers are practice-worn. His right middle finger is angled a little funny at the joint.

The entirety of his life is defined by these two hands and how well they function. The plays of his team live and die by how finely he can keep his control. The setter is the central player in a volleyball team’s system, the fulcrum, the transitional point of the ball.

When Atsumu looks at his own hands, he thinks of pivots and mechanical gears. He doesn’t think they’re particularly pretty.

He wonders if Sakusa thinks of his hands, then decides not to venture further down that road. Sakusa probably just wants to disinfect his sweaty palms, anyway.

.o0o.

The Interhigh is an exercise in patience and careful application. Inarizaki comes in with more experience and a second-year core as its backbone. The crowd parts in whispers as they pass. Atsumu grins in absolute satisfaction and thinks black uniforms really are the best for intimidation. 

(Itachiyama have a well-established reputation, of course, but their puke gradient isn’t menacing in the slightest. Atsumu takes comfort in this.)

To the surprise of no one, Inarizaki make it all the way to the finals. Atsumu had only glanced at the brackets once, hadn’t watched many of the other games. But he doesn’t have to check to know who’s waiting for them on the other side of the court.

Itachiyama had beaten Shiratorizawa, 29-27, 31-33, 26-24, to reach this point. But Inarizaki are fresh off their own upset win against Mujinazaka, and they have plans to keep playing spoiler in this tournament.

 _This time,_ Atsumu thinks, rolling his shoulders as he prepares to step onto the court. They’ll be the ones to take the throne, and not the so-called Tokyo kings.

When the two teams have taken up their positions on the court, Atsumu looks across the net and finds Sakusa watching him. They haven’t spoken nearly all tournament — and certainly not today — but the expression Sakusa’s face feels like a challenge.

That’s fine. Atsumu takes his stance and smiles like foxkill. If Sakusa is issuing a challenge then he’ll meet it.

Later, Atsumu spends an inordinately long amount of time outside the stadium with his face tilted up to the sky and his eyes closed. Absentmindedly, he wishes it were raining, if just for the aesthetic. He stands there until his cheeks are warm and he no longer feels like fracturing.

Then he turns and walks back inside, ready to face the rest of his team.

When he enters the lobby he’s greeted by a ruckus. Atsumu is a little caught off-guard until he finds the source — it’s hard to miss the yellow-green jersey. Then he realizes it’s _Sakusa_ and the ruckus is about him. A crowd has begun to gather and press, ask the other boy questions, take pictures. There’s discomfort written all over Sakusa’s face even with the mask covering half of it, and even a less decent person than Atsumu would realize the people need to stop.

But they don’t stop, and Sakusa’s wide eyes meet Atsumu’s across the crowd of people. And Atsumu doesn’t even pause to think — he just forces his way through the throng until he can reach out and grab Sakusa by the wrist, careful to touch jacket sleeve and not skin. He’s ruthless as he jostles people away from the other boy, knocking them aside while he tugs Sakusa along and away from the suffocating press of bodies. Atsumu doesn’t stop until they’re as far off as he can get, closer to the locker rooms than to the entrance.

“—san.”

He blinks, coming to an sudden stop and dropping Sakusa’s wrist. He turns around with wide eyes.

“Sorry, I.” Atsumu closes his mouth, opens it. Does it again. “Uh.”

“Atsumu-san.” There’s a faint rattle in Sakusa’s normally deadpan voice. He’s tugged his mask down. “You’re shaking.”

And isn’t that the clincher. Atsumu hasn’t even noticed, but he _is_ — he’s trembling all over, and not from frustration over the loss. He folds his arms, pins his hands to his waist, and forces himself to steady.

“So ’re you,” he points out defensively, because Sakusa is. Just a little, but the tremors are there.

Sakusa blinks at him, then looks down, as if he hadn’t even realized. Slowly, he closes those flutterbird fingers into fists, then takes a deep breath.

“You,” he starts, then frowns. “I.” His mouth twists into a little pout and Atsumu cannot believe what he’s seeing. “Thank you.”

“Oh.” Any eloquence has apparently escaped Atsumu in this time of trouble. “Uh, you’re. Yeah. Sure thing.”

There is the tiniest twitch in the corner of Sakusa’s mouth, blink-and-miss-it but there. There’s a faint flush of color high on those cheeks. Atsumu is struck with the strangest urge to reach out and see if it won’t smudge away.

“I’m gonna get back to my team,” Sakusa says. “You should do the same.”

At this point, Atsumu remembers that he’s supposed to be returning to the Inarizaki locker room because his team has to get back to their hotel and pack up their stuff. They need to catch a train from Osaka City back to Hyogo. He’d already been keeping them waiting with his shounen manga moment of contemplation outside the stadium, and now he’s just standing here with the imprint of Sakusa’s fine-boned wrist on his palm.

“Ah, yeah. I should, uh.” He rearranges his face into something like a smile. “I should go. Ah. Congratulations. Bye.”

He turns abruptly and stalks off without looking back to check Sakusa’s expression or hear his reply. When he gets to the locker room, he manages to answer Suna’s and Osamu’s sarcasm and banter, and it doesn’t feel like they’ve just lost. It doesn’t feel like he’s just pulled Sakusa out of a crowd and maybe seen him smile.

On the train back home, Atsumu stares at his right hand and tries to recall the feeling of Sakusa’s wrist in his grip. But all he can think of is that the other boy had called him _Atsumu-san_ and he can’t remember what his name sounds like in Sakusa’s voice.

.o0o.

When Atsumu gets another invite to the next youth training camp, he accepts without any hesitation. 

He’s the only one from Inarizaki this time, although he’s aware the pool is a little smaller. When he arrives in Nishigaoka, he recognizes some of the other players gathered; has even played against some. When he checks the attendance list, he finds Sakusa’s name a few lines below his.

It’ll be their first time seeing each other since Inarizaki’s three-set loss during the Interhigh finals, and the first time since he’d pulled Sakusa from a crowd and Sakusa had called him _Atsumu._

Any intentions Atsumu might have had go out the window on the first evening.

Kageyama Tobio is an interesting player. Atsumu has heard of him; talk of Miyagi’s _king of the court_ goes far in boy’s volleyball circles. This is the genius setter of the team that took down Ushijima Wakatoshi and Shiratorizawa in five hard-fought sets. 

Then Sakusa, of all people, stalks straight up to Kageyama and starts an inquisition.

 _How’d Wakatoshi-kun lose?,_ Atsumu hears Sakusa ask. _What trick did you use — or what, did someone actually stuff him?_

He almost laughs when Sakusa leans in, firing questions like bullets. Komori cuts in bravely, and Atsumu considers sliding into the bizarre conversation himself.

Then Kageyama says, “Sakusa-san, you haven’t gotten serious yet in this camp, have you?”

The cafeteria seems to grind to a halt as Sakusa stares at Kageyama and Kageyama stares back.

“Compared to the image I had of you,” the Karasuno setter adds, “you seem awfully _normal_ so far.”

Atsumu sees the moment Sakusa’s focus narrows down to the floppy-haired freshman in an uncomfortable plastic seat. And in the same moment, Atsumu decides: he does not like this boy.

Practice begins the next day, and Atsumu is surprised to find that Kageyama on the court is not at all what his off-court personality suggests. There is none of the bite he’d shown when he’d accused Sakusa of being ordinary; his technique is faultless, but he floats each set up like he’s asking for a favor, like he’s being _deferential._

Atsumu throws each ball up as a demand for the spiker to hit it with nothing less than their best. He refuses to believe this prim little boy is anywhere near his equal.

He watches Kageyama tell Hoshiumi, expression completely guileless, _you’re a useful reference, though,_ and wonders where any of this attitude was in the practice match.

“Tobio-kun,” he says carelessly, “ya may give a prickly impression, but out on the court...” Atsumu’s grin is foxkill. “You’re an awful sweet goody two-shoes, ain’tcha?”

There is a sweet, vindictive satisfaction in watching Kageyama freeze up, facial muscles twitching in muted fury. He turns away from the other boy and breezes past everyone, headed to where their gear sits piled on the sidelines so he can grab a drink.

“Goody two-shoes, huh,” Sakusa says, appearing beside him and reaching around for his personal water bottle. There’s tape on two of his fingers.

Atsumu smirks around the mouth of the bottle, then swallows, smacking his lips. “I’m not wrong, ya know,” he points out, smiling like candy’s between his teeth. “His sets’re always so _polite._ ”

“Meanwhile, you’re just rude in general.”

That actually makes Atsumu snort, although Sakusa looks as deadpan as ever. The fact that Sakusa doesn’t even mean it as a joke just makes everything funnier.

“Omi-kun,” Atsumu drawls, leaning in just a little. “Lemme set for ya.”

( _Look at me._ )

Sakusa regards him for a long, pointed moment before cutting his gaze away.

“We’re not on the same team for this round,” is all he answers before he walks off.

When they finally _are_ on the same team, in the positional shuffle drill, Sakusa is playing middle blocker while Atsumu is an outside hitter. He’s unsurprised to find Sakusa takes to defense the same way he does a spike — careful, analytical, watching the ball intently before he goes up for a block. He uses deflections just as much as he stuffs a ball. He keeps a cautious distance from the blocker beside him.

Not for the first time, Atsumu wonders why the hell someone like Sakusa is in competitive volleyball of all things. Then again, he can’t imagine the boy doing anything else.

He gets one opportunity to set the ball, when their purported-setter digs an off-the-block hit that breaks their formation. In his peripheral vision, Atsumu sees Sakusa already falling back for the run-up.

 _Demanding bastard,_ he thinks, but he’s wearing that foxkill grin as he lifts up his hands and tosses the ball backwards for Sakusa to hit a center quick.

The other boy sends it perfectly just to the inside of the end line. His hand flexes open-close as he lands quietly on his feet. As usual, he has no celebrations after scoring.

“Nice kill,” Atsumu says anyway. He doesn’t hold out a hand.

Sakusa glances at him sidewise for a moment before huffing. “Your crap set was too far left,” he mutters. His right hand twitches slightly, flutterbird fingers shifting, as if about to reach.

Atsumu stares for a moment, then smirks.

“If ya couldn’t hit that, I’d kick ya off the court.”

They are alone together all of once, when Atsumu stays later than everyone else to practice his serves. He wants to fine-tune the control of his jump serve so he can pick points off the opposing team’s libero or target their worst receiver. He’s gotten eight serves in when someone appears on the other side of the court.

Sakusa’s receive form is perfect as he neatly steps in and bumps the ball to fall just in front of the net. Atsumu watches it hit the floor and feels pleasantly infuriated.

“Didja need something, Omi-kun?” he asks. (He wonders if Sakusa remembers.)

There’s a ball cart a little ways away from Sakusa, who’s shaking out his arms. Even with the face mask off, at this distance, Atsumu can’t get a read on his expression.

“Trade you serves and receives,” Sakusa replies, then motions for Atsumu to go first. Apparently Atsumu has no room to say no (not that he would, but it’s the principle of it).

He makes the first one a jump floater, just to force Sakusa into stumbling forward to bump it up before it hits the floor. He can feel the glower directed at him across the net even if he can’t see it, and grins cheekily in response. The grin gets wiped off his face once Sakusa picks up his own ball and sends it careening to the other end of the court.

Atsumu had already learned from the first Spring High that Sakusa’s hits are a pain in the ass to receive. It’s not just the power he puts into them, although he packs a punch when he means to. Despite being right-handed, there’s a wicked spin to each ball. Without blockers to at least deflect the ball or slow it down, it comes at Atsumu full-force and unhindered.

He does his best, but the ball still ricochets to the far wall.

At the end line, Sakusa tips his head to the side.

“That’s one point to me,” he says, and Atsumu is going to snap those wrists if it scratches the smugness from that voice.

(When dinner forces them to call off their impromptu competition, the score is 17-11 to Sakusa. Atsumu would feel more pissed off if there wasn’t a little spark in Sakusa’s eyes when he pushes his ball cart into the storage room beside Atsumu’s.

Actually — scratch that. He’s still immensely pissed off, and he’s going to get back at Sakusa in the upcoming Spring High. But he also risks it and bumps his shoulder (clothed) against Sakusa’s (also clothed) briefly.

Sakusa makes a soft noise under his breath, then nods in the direction of the gym door.

Atsumu trots after him, maintaining a careful distance between them as they go. He tries not to think of Sakusa’s hands and how their fingers had almost brushed.)

.o0o.

When the Spring High arrives, Atsumu walks up to the Tokyo Metropolitan Gymnasium with his head held up, shoulders thrown back. This time, _this time,_ this is their year. They’d already taken one set off Itachiyama in the last Interhigh, and the whole team is better with half a year more of experience. They have new weapons, new tricks. They have Atsumu.

(That they get to dispatch Kageyama and Karasuno in their very first match is simply the cherry on top of a milkshake. Atsumu is eager to show up that little goody two-shoes setter on the court. He also, admittedly, wants to see what kind of team had taken down Shiratorizawa, and what kind of teammate Kageyama has that makes Hoshiumi seem less like a freak exception and more like a _useful reference._ )

The sound of their school cheer team always needles at Atsumu just as much as it exhilarates him. He still thinks their banner is pretentious as hell, but he’s coming to see the point of it. And of course, he preens under the attention of the cameras, the reporters who talk about his _potential_ and his _undeniable skill._

“Shut up,” Osamu says beside him. His twin isn’t even looking at him, he’s bent over tying his laces.

“I didn’t even say anything!” Atsumu protests, askance.

“Ya don’t have to.” Osamu straightens, looking at him flatly. “‘S just,” and here he gestures vaguely at all of Atsumu, top to toe, “you.”

Atsumu doesn’t even have a response to that. He’s not sure what expression he’s making but he hopes it conveys his derision. Still, later, when they’ve finished the official warm-ups and gathered around their dugout ahead of the match, he taps his twin on the arm.

“Ya got this?” he asks, cocking an eyebrow. 

Osamu huffs a sigh, but Atsumu can read the look on his twin’s face.

“I’ll jump,” Osamu tells him.

It’s all either of them need.

(The worst thing, in the end — the thing that really hits — is the slightly-wistful look on Kita’s face when it’s all over. It always hurts, letting someone down.)

Atsumu is getting really tired of standing outside stadiums and staring at the sky like it’ll have all the answers. He wishes the wind would at least dramatically blow so his hair looks better than a sweat-matted mess, but he’s also kind of thankful because it’d be colder than it already is. He wonders, briefly, if he’s always fated to fall short of the lofty goals he’s set for himself in high school volleyball.

He would slap himself, but his hands still hurt, so.

“Some goody two-shoes, huh,” a familiar voice says behind him.

(The last thing Atsumu needs is Sakusa Kiyoomi with his pretty hands witnessing Atsumu at fracture point after elimination in the _second round_ of the Spring High. Perhaps Kita is right and the gods are always watching, and this is karma for stealing Osamu’s limited edition pudding last year.)

 _Fuck off,_ he wants to say.

“Shoulda known better,” he admits instead. 

Sakusa makes a considering hum, coming to stand beside Atsumu. At least he’s wearing his black-and-white jacket this time. He’s also surprisingly bare-faced.

“I’ve seen better setters than Kageyama,” he says with half a shrug. “But they got the better of you as a team. Nothing else to dwell on. You guys lost.”

Atsumu stares at Sakusa, feeling something scratch at the back of his throat. When he opens his mouth he finds it’s a laugh. And laugh he does — doubled over, fist pressed to his mouth to try and muffle his hysterics. The way Sakusa’s expression scrunches in confusion and affront just sets him off harder.

“Ya know—” Atsumu gasps, swiping at his face then wiping his palms on his shorts. “Anyone ever tell ya you fuckin’ suck at comforting people?”

He shakes his head and tips his head back. There’s no foxkill in his grin right now.

There’s a faint brush against the back of his hand, and then slowly — tentatively — unbelievably — flutterbird fingers slide through his.

Sakusa is staring straight ahead as he lets his hand dangle loosely in Atsumu’s.

This — Atsumu doesn’t know how to take this. Does Sakusa understand what this means, how much this upends him? Does he know how wrecked this leaves Atsumu even if it’s nothing more than five fingers threaded through his with an inch of space between the backs of their hands? Does he see the way Atsumu looks at his hands and thinks about bird wings and breaking?

“I’ve,” Sakusa admits, brow furrowed, uncertain, “never held someone’s hand before.”

(This is what it takes to rob a human of the breath in their lungs: a quiet confession into a quiet afternoon, and the hesitant touch of a boy.)

Atsumu takes a chance and squeezes once, lightly. “I’ll be careful,” he answers. This is the most honest he’s felt off a volleyball court.

“You _are_ a setter,” Sakusa adds, and — oh, that’s a _joke,_ and _oh,_ oh, he’s—

—silver bell,

spare change,

wind chime—

—laughing.

(Atsumu maybe wants to kiss him.)

“Anyway,” Sakusa goes on, “this just makes things easier for us to win everything. Thanks for losing.”

Atsumu rips his hand from Sakusa’s as he leans back in indignation.

“Ya _little_ —”

“Finally.” Sakusa has pulled out a sanitary wipe from his pocket and is cleaning his fingers. “It was really gross how you looked like a kicked puppy. I wanted to push you down the stairs.”

“ _Hey!_ ”

“I really am glad you lost, though.” Sakusa turns back to Atsumu, and his expression has smoothed over. He means it, of course. Atsumu would expect nothing less.

“Omi-kun,” he says, squaring his shoulders. “Next time, we’ll beat ya.”

Sakusa rolls his eyes. “Just you try.”

Atsumu simply grins and trots back toward the stadium, Sakusa following an arm’s length away.

It’s the Spring High of Atsumu’s second year in high school and Inarizaki has just lost. He has two more competitions to try and win, two more to get the better of the boy beside him. And maybe he won’t; maybe Inarizaki will always come up against Itachiyama and fail, maybe they won’t even meet because one of them will lose first. Maybe Atsumu will graduate as nothing more than a _could-have-been._

Or maybe Inarizaki will finally win in the next Interhigh. Who even knows.

For now, Atsumu knows the feeling of Sakusa’s soft-wing fingers in his. He knows the soft huff of Sakusa’s laugh. He still hurts, in his palms and his knees and between his ribs.

“Omi-kun,” he says as they approach the stadium entrance, “I really hope ya fuckin’ lose today.”

Sakusa makes a smothered noise that might have been a snort.

“Of course you would,” he replies.

Atsumu’s still grinning when they part.

**Author's Note:**

> thank you for reading!! catch me yelling about haikyuu and other stuff on twitter at [@redluxite](https://twitter.com/redluxite) ^__^ you can also check there for ways to support my writing.

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [in disguise of revelation [PODFIC]](https://archiveofourown.org/works/24300469) by [alstroemeria_thoughts (aurantiaca)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/aurantiaca/pseuds/alstroemeria_thoughts)




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